The heir to Jackdaw

Many people I see ask the blog, lack of activity, and about the new boat I have mentioned. Here's the story.

Last fall we started plans to bring Jackdaw to the Wayzata Yacht Club on Lake Minnetonka. Kept in a slip there, we would race her in the twice-weekly races. And that was the plan. Until BlueJ crossed our transom again. BlueJ is a very rare 1996 Beneteau First 260; in fact she is the only example in the USA. The bigger boat with inboard diesel would be great on Lake Minnetonka, and I have done all the updates to Jackdaw that I could think of. We had looked at her once before while looking into the boat that would become Kestrel. The timing seemed too good to be true.

26 feet long and all waterline, she looks like a mini Volvo Ocean Race boat. I think she the best looking sailboat under 30 feet. She has her own blog as well, HERE.


Here Pia and I race a few Sundays ago. The blue hull and dual rudders make her really stand out. Designed by renowned designer Jean-Marie Finot, you can find more information HERE

You might note a new boat on Harriet that looks like BlueJ. It her little sister, the First 210.

I'll continue to post items that I hear about, and anyone can contact me for ideas on new posts.

Happy sailing and fair winds,  Clay



Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

DNR map of Lake Harriet

Image
The Minnesota DNR publishes a bottom contour map of Lake Harriet. Although not really intended for ship navigation, it shows good anchorage locations and is handy to have on-board. It also shows that unlike Lake Calhoun, Lake Harriet is uniformly deep, and that means that is is mostly free of the nasty Milfoil that plagues its sister lake. The full-size map in PDF format is HERE . FYI, a map of Lake Calhoun is  HERE .  If you own a Garmin handheld GPS and are interested in a FREE depth chart of the lakes, be sure to see this post HERE .
Read more

Keeping an eye on swimmers

Image
Maybe it's just me, but it seems there are a LOT more people free-swimming across the lakes. I'm sure it is people training for the triathlons, and I didn't give it much thought until last night, when we almost ran over one. We were reaching at about 5 knots, sitting on the low side to induce some heel when we quickly slipped by a swimmer. We didn't see him, and he didn't hear us. I don't know who was more surprised, but I DO know who was in more danger. There was over 20 boats on the lake last evening. Under these conditions, swimming in the open water is just dangerous. I knew the MPRB was thinking about setting up open swim areas, but was pretty sure they had not done so. I called them, and they confirmed that open swimming was illegal, and pointed me to THIS page on their site. In addition, that told me I should call 911 to report swimmers. I'm not sure that I'll do that, but I would really hate to hit one, or even come close. I don't know
Read more

Vandals On Lake Harriet Strike Again

Image
I have to report that sadly, a boat has been damaged by mindless vandals again on Lake Harriet. Unbelievably, it has happened to one of the boats that was heavily damaged in last August's attack. This time, they broke into a forward hatch, climbed in, and after drinking some beer they brought with them and smoking some pot, ransacked the boat. I LOST a boat in that last attack, so writing this post makes me feel ill. And as bad as this all is, there are several factors that make this even more disturbing. 1) It could have been prevented. The MPRB tenders were NOT locked up last Friday night, and the punks used the tender to row over to the first big boat that could get to. Like Annie mentions in her email, if you DO NOT HAND the tender to another buoy holder, you must lock it back up. No exceptions. You now see what can happen if you do not. 2) Unlike a pure theft of property, these attacks are almost 'mindless'. They want in more then they want you stuff, but they wil
Read more